In a world where history may sometimes seem busy repeating itself, the ability to find your way around traditional paper archives is increasingly useful. Whether it’s war, genocide, the Cold War or the environment: historical stories are becoming more and more – well – current.
In this session we’ll show you how to transfer data and OSINT skills to working with paper and historical records. We will explain how to find stories in the material and how to find both historical and current sources. We’ll show you some – hopefully – inspiring examples, and we’ll discuss why it’s not smart to accidentally download 500,000 records from the National Archives.
No previous knowledge and no additional materials (e.g. laptop) are required for this session.
Ernst Arbouw is a writer and journalist from the Netherlands. He works as a freelancer for de Volkskrant, where he writes about science, history, climate and - somehow - beached whales.In his book H.W.R. was hier ('H.W.R. was here', published 2021), he combined investigative journalism... Read More →
Solomon's investigation, "Who Owns the media", mapped the media owned by the top 10 oligarchs behind the biggest media conglomerates in Greece and, more importantly, it mapped the oligarchs' broader businesses. We identified more than 800 companies in sectors such as shipping, energy, sports, banking, and real estate, and searched business registries in more than 30 countries. The data were published in an interactive network diagram and a dedicated website.
We will present the methodology for dealing with large amounts of data, how to find companies of the same owner, and investigate business registries all over the world. We will work on case studies of specific companies and deal with the possible difficulties involved. The plan is to give attendees the tools to take this investigation and apply it to other countries.
Eliza Triantafyllou is an investigative journalist based in Athens. She reports mainly on financial and business issues. She works for Inside Story, an independent online media outlet, and is a member of the investigative journalism outfit “the Manifold.” Formerly, she worked... Read More →
Danai Maragoudaki is a Greek journalist based in Athens. She works for Solomon, an investigative and independent media outlet in Greece. Her reporting focuses on transparency, finance, and digital threats.In 2024, she was part of the team that conducted the cross-border investigation... Read More →
In this session, De Smog's journalists will share their experience and tips from a recent investigation that traced the supply chain of feed used in farmed fish sold in UK supermarkets.
Attendees will gain an understanding of where to obtain data for a supply chain investigation: such as trade data (including via FOI), shipping route data, and information hidden on supermarket packaging. The session will also showcase examples of how to interpret and analyse these data.
Hazel Healy is UK Editor-in-Chief of award-winning environmental investigations outlet DeSmog. She specializes in climate and food politics stories that uncover conflicts of interest, double-dealing and greenwashing.
In cities all over Europe, buildings are treated as investments rather than as (increasingly rare) spaces for people to live in. Every year, tens of thousands of former family homes, industrial and office spaces are being vacated and demolished – most of them in order for speculators to build expensive replacements for buildings that could have been renovated much more cheaply. With the help of the crowd, investigative media house CORRECTIV launched a "demolition atlas" where people share information about planned demolitions and possible speculation. So far this has covered Switzerland, Germany and Greece, working with media partner, Solomon. In this session, we will show you how we reached thousands of people willing to participate, what kind of stories emerged, and look at how you can do the same in your country – no previous knowledge required.
CORRECTIV.Switzerland is the Swiss branch of the investigative media house, CORRECTIV. My team and I cover stories all over Switzerland. We also run the CrowdNewsroom, CORRECTIV's digital platform for crowd based investigations. We're based in Berne, but have also facilitated crowd... Read More →
Danai Maragoudaki is a Greek journalist based in Athens. She works for Solomon, an investigative and independent media outlet in Greece. Her reporting focuses on transparency, finance, and digital threats.In 2024, she was part of the team that conducted the cross-border investigation... Read More →
In this session, we'll explore the methodology behind Newtral's data-driven investigation of flood-prone buildings and areas in Spain, which allowed the data team to find that at least 200,000 buildings in the country are vulnerable to flooding. The investigation didn't only rely on traditional soil or urban studies to identify flood-prone areas; it also used information from Spain's National Cadastral to gather the data, city by city, street by street, of all the buildings constructed in vulnerable or hazardous zones. We will share a model that can be replicated or scaled elsewhere in Europe, particularly in the Mediterranean region.
Attendees will learn how to source, process, and visualize cartographic data of urban typology to identify threatened areas. This session is suitable for beginners. Attendees should have Python installed, along with a code editor like Visual Studio Code. No coding knowledge is necessary - the code will be shared with you, and you can just follow along. If you use Windows, please install Ubuntu (not necessary for Mac users).
